SyntaxError

Baseline Widely available

This feature is well established and works across many devices and browser versions. It’s been available across browsers since July 2015.

The SyntaxError object represents an error when trying to interpret syntactically invalid code. It is thrown when the JavaScript engine encounters tokens or token order that does not conform to the syntax of the language when parsing code.

SyntaxError is a serializable object, so it can be cloned with structuredClone() or copied between Workers using postMessage().

SyntaxError is a subclass of Error.

Constructor

SyntaxError()

Creates a new SyntaxError object.

Instance properties

Also inherits instance properties from its parent Error.

These properties are defined on SyntaxError.prototype and shared by all SyntaxError instances.

SyntaxError.prototype.constructor

The constructor function that created the instance object. For SyntaxError instances, the initial value is the SyntaxError constructor.

SyntaxError.prototype.name

Represents the name for the type of error. For SyntaxError.prototype.name, the initial value is "SyntaxError".

Instance methods

Inherits instance methods from its parent Error.

Examples

Catching a SyntaxError

js
try {
  eval("hoo bar");
} catch (e) {
  console.log(e instanceof SyntaxError); // true
  console.log(e.message);
  console.log(e.name); // "SyntaxError"
  console.log(e.stack); // Stack of the error
}

Creating a SyntaxError

js
try {
  throw new SyntaxError("Hello");
} catch (e) {
  console.log(e instanceof SyntaxError); // true
  console.log(e.message); // "Hello"
  console.log(e.name); // "SyntaxError"
  console.log(e.stack); // Stack of the error
}

Specifications

Specification
ECMAScript Language Specification
# sec-native-error-types-used-in-this-standard-syntaxerror

Browser compatibility

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See also